Frontiers of life

Wachtershauser G (1992) Order out of Order Heritage of the Iron-sulfur World. In Tran Thanh Van J und K, Mounolou JC, Schneider J, Me Kay C (Eds.) Frontiers of Life. Editions Frontiers, Gif-sur-Y vette, pp 21-39 Wachtershauser G (1997) J Theor Biol 187 483 Wachtershauser G (2000) Science 289 1307 Weber AL (1981) J Mol Evol 17 103 Weber AL (1984) Origins of Life 15 17 Weber A (1998) Orig Life Evol Biosphere 28 259 Weiss A (1963) Angew Chem 75 113, Int Ed 2 134 Weiss A (1981) Angew Chem 93 843, Int Ed 20 850 Wieland T, Pfleiderer G (1957) Advances in Enzymology 19 235 Wills C, Bada J (2000) The Spark of Life. Perseus, Cambridge Mass. 

With respect to the frontiers of life itself three basic questions may be asked How Where Why ... 

Cairns-Smith C (1992) In Tran Thanh VanJ, MounolouJC, Schneider J, McKay C (eds) Frontiers of life. Editions Frontieres, Gif-sur-Yvette, France, pp 119-132... 

Pohorille A, New N (2002) Models of protocellular structures, functions and evolution (Abstract). In Proc of the Xllth Rencontres de Blois Frontiers of Life Conference, 2000, Chateau de Blois, France... 

Cairns-Smith, A.G. 2002. The origin of life Clays. Pp. 169-192 in Frontiers of Life, Volume 1 (D. Baltimore, R. Dulbecco, F. Jacob, and R. Levi-Montaldni, eds.). Academic Press, San Diego, Calif. 

Wachtershauser G (1992) Order out of Order Heritage of the Iron-sulfur World. In Tran Thanh Van J und K, Mounolou JC, Schneider J, Me Kay C (Eds.) Frontiers of Life. Editions Frontiers, Gif-sur-Yvette, pp 21-39 Wachtershauser G (1997) J Theor Biol 187 483... 

Goldanskii, V. I. Semenov, N. N. (1992) Chirality, Origin of Life and Evolution. In J. K. TrSn Thanh Van ct.al. (eds.). Frontiers of Life, Editions Frontiers, Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex, France, pp. 67-85. 

Seitz, F. (1994) On the Frontier My Life in Science (American Institute of Physics, New York). 

Bakasov A, Ha T-K, Quack M (1995) Ab initio Calculation of molecular energies including parity violating interactions. In Chela-Flores J, Raulin F (eds) Chemical Evolution Physics of the Origin of Life. Kluwer, Dordrecht Boston London, p 287 Ball P (1994) Designing the Molecular World, Chemistry at the Frontier, Princeton University... 

Acknowledgments The study was supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research from the Ministry of Education, Science, Sports, Culture and Technology, Japan, and by Rikkyo University Frontier Project Life s Adaptation Strategies to Environmental Changes . SCA thanks CREST project operated by the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST). The authors thank N. Yoshimura for his assistance. 

Such an enterprise, which one cannot (and should not) at the present stage outline in detail except for initial steps, rests on the presupposition that there may be more than one expression of the processes characterizing life. It thus invites us to explore the frontiers of other forms of lifef and of the chemical evolution of living worlds. 

Adaptation and evolution have created an astonishing variety of life on this planet. Smart materials and adaptive systems may do the same for instruments, machines, and other technological tools and techniques. The expansion of this scientific frontier has the potential to revolutionize much of the technology that people use for medicine, transportation, and industry. 

Seekers of knowledge satisfy their curiosity about how the world and its organisms work, but the applications of science are not limited to intellectual achievement. The topics in Frontiers of Science affect society on a multitude of levels. Civilization has always faced an uphill battle to procure scarce resources, solve technical problems, and maintain order. In modern times, one of the most important resources is energy, and the physics of fusion potentially offers a nearly boundless supply. Technology makes life easier and solves many of today s problems, and nanotechnology may extend the range of devices into extremely small sizes. Protecting one s personal information in transactions conducted via the Internet is a crucial application of computer science. 

Our examples should be drawn from the frontiers of physical chemistry, to show that it is still a dynamic, living subject even though its underlying principles are now a century old. Those examples should include biological applications, but not to the exclusion of the contributions that physical chemistry makes to other branches of science and daily life. 

In the field of artificial life we are today at a level that organic life reached about 4 billion years ago, at the time of the so-called primordial soup, but the interesting thing is that we could actually witness the origin of this new form of life with our own eyes. This is the last frontier of mechanism, the borderline beyond which the dream could become true. 

On October 10, 1731, at Nice, a son was born to Lady Anne Cavendish, who had gone to France in search of health. This Cavendish was not destined to wield power in public life, as his parents had hoped. Rather did he devote his long life to the cultivation of science purely for its own sake. In him the pioneer spirit was to push back the frontiers of chemical knowledge. 

Radiation sciences continue to push forward the frontiers of understanding and to expand the capabilities of technology. The scare of the bomb, however, still remains with us. It is good to know that at least two international organizations, IAEA and CTBTO, are taking care that we continue to use radioactivity for the improvement of the quality of life only. 

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